4 Content Marketing Tactics You Need To Use Right Now

Marketing “tactics” are a dime a dozen. Some are great and some are gimmicky. Once you sort through all the noise, there are some that are very effective that you need to be using. That’s what we’re talking about today. Tactics and tricks aren’t just about getting to the goal faster - that makes them seem like a quick scam. Tactics and tricks are about simplifying and speeding up your marketing processes. If you can use these resources - while still maintaining the high level of quality that you need - then your marketing will be operating much more effectively and getting you to your business goals faster.

The tactics that we’ll talk about here are all related to content marketing in some way. Some will help align your strategy and goals; others will help you pinpoint the right audience for your campaign. All of them will help you create more effective content by getting in front of the right people at the right time.

Focusing on Content Marketing

No matter how small or large your company is, content marketing offers an excellent way to bring in new, better traffic to your site. To get content marketing right, you need to understand where your audience is coming from, what platforms they use, and what types of content will convert them into buyers. Most commonly today, you will want to focus on mobile-first content, native ads, and marketing automation.

Mobile-first content is content that optimized for smart phones. Today, over 60% of website traffic comes from mobile devices - and that number is only increasing (50% of website traffic was mobile in 2017). Optimizing for mobile means paying attention to mobile UI, content layout, image sizes, and page load times. Many of these items are easily managed through your website CMS. If your mobile website is fast and easy to navigate, your content will be viewed much more often.

Native ads are ads that are designed specifically for each platform that they appear on. The content of the ad, the layout, and format are all designed for each specific platform. These are the ads that flow seamlessly with the other content you might find on the platform, so oftentimes they don’t even seem like ads. Examples of native ads are “In Feed” ads on Facebook or “Recommended Content” ads at the end of articles or blog posts.

Marketing automation helps you automate repetitive tasks and market across channels more easily. This gives you the ability to target customers automatically with sets of instructions called workflows. Think of a time when you subscribed to a company’s email newsletter and then immediately received a welcome email. That welcome email is the result of a marketing automation triggered by your subscription to their newsletter. Your can set up your automation workflows on email platforms, social media, your website, or text. Automation workflows are easy to set up with templates or from scratch on most platforms.

Many content marketing techniques are about engaging new audiences, not improving the performance of audiences you already have. The general purpose of content marketing as a digital media strategy is to deliver valuable information to the targeted audience, drive traffic, and drive conversions. Unless you’re segmenting content to specifically target new potential customers, don’t disregard marketing to your existing customer base. It is almost always more cost-effective for a business to retain an existing customer than to acquire a new one.

Aligning Strategy

Your goals and objectives for your marketing should align with your business's overall objectives. Your strategic marketing plan defines goals and defines what types of marketing tactics you will use to reach customers, including content marketing, SEO, email marketing, social media, and advertising. A digital marketing strategy is a plan that describes how your company will reach marketing goals through online channels such as search and social media. Examples of digital marketing strategies include a social media campaign that includes influencer partnerships, a content marketing strategy that uses online guides to generate leads, or a growth marketing strategy that uses social media and emails to create customer loyalty. Whenever you create marketing campaigns or strategies, make sure that they relate directly back to a business goal or goals. This makes it much easier to analyze performance, measure ROI (return on investment), and gather takeaways to use in future strategies.

Automating Social Media

Brands can utilize both unpaid (organic) and paid social media marketing tactics to drive online sales and build awareness. Social media marketing (SMM) uses social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram to promote your content, products, or services; increase brand awareness and visibility; build fans or followers; attract customers--both existing and potential--and generate traffic to your website. Effective SMM should include content curation, scheduling posts related to products, and automating as much as possible.

Segmenting in Email Marketing

To implement the techniques of segmenting an audience correctly in an email marketing strategy, you need to look for opportunities to split up your audience into groups. These groups or “segments” will all have one idea that they relate to. Let’s say you run a golf course and want to segment your email list. “Segment A” could be members of Ladies League. “Segment B” could be Families for Junior Golf. With these segments, you can send emails that are targeted directly at the audience in each segment. Targeted emails lead to higher conversion rates and more sales.

To get started with segmenting, look for opportunities to diversify your strategy by researching your audience first. You should choose segments that are closely related to one specific subject. This way the emails that you send can be direct and specific. You can create as many segments as you’d like, but make sure that there are enough contacts in each segment to make sending emails worthwhile. Connecting with your audience and engaging them is critical in todays marketplace if you are looking to make a profit.

Wrap It Up

To make sure that your content marketing strategy is driving results, you need to get producing content! Content that answers the questions or needs of your audience and aligns to business goals is the number one driver of effective marketing. By focusing on specific customers on specific platforms you’re creating a seemingly personalized experience that is much more likely to convent potential buyers into actual buyers. Content focused marketing brings together the heavy hitters--SEO, social media, and email--to strategically drive qualified leads, nurture customer relationships, and build your brand effectively.